Friday, February 24, 2006

If it's been a long time since you thought your head was going to explode and you really miss the feeling, you might want to check out SuperPatriots.US, a Web site devoted to Jonathan Keith "Jack" Idema, the bounty hunter who was convicted in Afghanistan after it was discovered that he was running a freelance torture operation. Prior to that, Idema had been convicted of fraud in the U.S., had peddled phony Al Qaeda training tapes to Dan Rather and Mary Mapes at CBS, and had (according to some accounts) helped rewrite Robin Moore's bestseller The Hunt for bin Laden in manuscript so that he, Idema, was its hero (see this New York magazine story for details).

I've barely sampled SuperPatriots, which starts right off on the title screen with invocations of "Trailer Tramp Condolezza Rice" and "American traitor and pro-Taliban puke Hamid Karzai" (these are the people who won't free Idema from an Afghan prison so he can return to torturing Islamofascists). Over here there's a list of villains, in this case folks you've never heard of, though they've clearly crossed Idema ("Chris Thompson, Woman Beater," "The Phony Colonel Joe Cafasso," etc.). And here's a page with blurry stills that clearly prove Idema was really working for the U.S. government, at least if you're already convinced.

In addition to all this, there's a "Free Jack Idema Blogburst" (though it's not much of a burst) in the murkier corners of Blogistan. It's being led by Cao's Blog and Rottweiler Puppy. At Cao's Blog, we learn this about Idema's suffering:

Shortly after their [Jack and his team's] arrest, they were subjected to varying degrees of torture and interrogation....

Idema was tortured with boiling water, starvation, threats of death, and assault with various implements (such as wire cables and rubber whips), resulting in broken ribs, a separated sternum, torn rotator cuffs, hemorrhaged eyes, multiple concussions, lacerations, contusions, and bruises....

Subsequent torture after the "interrogation phase" included beatings, 24 hour a day restraints, falaqua, whipping, threats of execution, attempted rape, beatings with sticks even while Task Force Sabre/7 were using bathrooms or naked taking baths....


All that reportedly happened after Idema's arrest in July 2004. Do you believe it? Before you answer, here's a picture of Idema taken at the beginning of his trial the following month. And here are some more pictures. Now do you believe it?

New York magazine tells us this about Idema's prison:

Early press reports indicated that three prisoners found in Idema's custody during the raid were blindfolded and beaten and strapped to the ceiling by their feet; five others were tied to chairs with rope in a small, dark room down a hall that was littered with bloodied clothing. All of the prisoners in Idema's custody were subsequently released; none was shown to be connected to Al Qaeda.

Yeah, a real superpatriot.

(Via Kathryn Cramer.)

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